Beheld an emperor on its golden round;

An earthly providence!

Cat.

But it is vanish'd-gone.

'Twas so!-'twas so !

Aur. That day shall come again; or, in its place, One that shall be an era to the world!

Cat. What's in your thoughts?

Aur.

Our high and hurried life

Has left us strangers to each other's souls:
But now we think alike. You have a sword!
Have had a famous name i' the legions!

Cat.

Hush!

Aur. Have the walls ears? alas! I wish they had; And tongues too, to bear witness to my oath,

Has she not cast you out; and would you sink
With her, when she can give you no gain else
Of her fierce fellowship?
Who'd seek the chain,

That link'd him to his mortal enemy?

Who'd face the pestilence in his foe's house?

Who, when the poisoner drinks by chance the cup,
That was to be his death, would squeeze the dregs,
To find a drop to bear him company?

Cat. It will not come to this.

Aur. (haughtily.)

I'll not be dragg'd,

A show to all the city rabble ;-robb'd,—

Down to the very mantle on our backs,—

A pair of branded beggars! Doubtless Cicero

Cat. Cursed be the ground he treads! Name him no

more.

Aur. Doubtless, he 'll see us to the city gates;

"Twill be the least respect that he can pay

To his fallen rival. With all his lictors shouting, "Room for the noble vagrants; all caps

off

For Catiline! for him that would be Consul."

Cat. (turning away.) Thus to be, like the scorpion, ring'd with fire,

Till I sting mine own heart! (aside.) There is no hope! Aur. Öne hope there is, worth all the rest-Revenge! The time is harass'd, poor, and discontent;

Your spirit practised, keen, and desperate,

L

The senate full of feuds-the city vext
With petty tyranny-the legions wrong'd-

Cat. Yet, who has stirr'd? Aurelius, you paint the air With passion's pencil.

Aur.

Were my will a sword!

Cat. Hear me, bold heart! The whole gross blood of
Rome

Could not atone my wrongs! I'm soul-shrunk, sick,
Weary of man! And now my mind is fix'd
For Lybia there to make companionship
Rather of bear and tiger,-of the snake,-
The lion in his hunger,-than of man!

Aur. I had a father once, who would have plunged
Rome in the Tiber for an angry look!

You saw our entrance from the Gaulish war,
When Sylla fled ?

Cat.

My legion was in Spain.

Aur. Rome was all eyes; the ancient totter'd forth; The cripple propp'd his limbs beside the wall;

The dying left his bed to look—and die.
The way before us was a sea of heads;
The way behind a torrent of brown spears:
So on we rode, in fierce and funeral pomp,
Through the long, living streets.

Cat. Those triumphs are but gewgaws.
What is it? Dust and smoke.

All the earth,

I've done with life!

Aur. Before that eve-one hundred senators—
And fifteen hundred knights, had paid-in blood,
The price of taunts, and treachery, and rebellion!
Were my tongue thunder-I would cry, Revenge!
Cat. No more of this! Begone and leave me!
There is a whirling lightness in my brain,
That will not now bear questioning. Away!

[As Aurelius moves slowly towards the door. Where are our veterans now? Look on these walls; I cannot turn their tissues into life.

Where are our revenues-our chosen friends?

Are we not beggars? Where have beggars friends?
I see no swords and bucklers on these floors!

I shake the state! I-What have I on earth
But these two hands? Must I not dig or starve ?
Come back! I had forgot. My memory dies,
I think, by the hour. Who sups with us to-night?
Let all be of the rarest,-spare no cost.

If 'tis our last;-it may be-let us sink
In sumptuous ruin, with wonderers round us!
Our funeral pile shall send up amber smokes ;
We'll burn in myrrh, or-blood!

SECTION XLIII.

FALSTAFF-SHALLOW-SILENCE-BARDOLPH-BULL-CALF

..Shakspeare.

WART-MOULDY-FEEBLE......

Shallow. Look, here comes good Sir John.

Give me

your good hand, give me your worship's good hand: By my troth, you look well, and bear your years very well: welcome, good Sir John.

Falstaff. I am glad to see you well, good master Robert Shallow :-Master Sure-card, as I think.

Shal. No, Sir John; it is my cousin Silence, in commission with me.

Fal. Good master Silence, it well befits you should be of the peace.

Sil. Your good worship is welcome.

Fal. Gentlemen, have you provided me here half a dozen sufficient men?

Shal. Marry, have we sir. Will you sit?

Fal. Let me see them, I beseech you.

Shal. Where's the roll? where's the roll? where's the roll?-Let me see, let me see. Ralph Mouldy :-let them appear as I call; let them do so, let them do so.

see; where is Mouldy?

Moul. Here, an't please you.

Shal.

-Let me

What think you, Sir John? a good limbed fellow;

young, strong, and of good friends.

Fal. Is thy name Mouldy?

Moul. Yea, an't please you.

Fal. 'Tis the more time thou wert used.

Shal Ha, ha, ha! are mouldy, lack use. said, Sir John.

Fal. Prick him.

most excellent, i'faith! things that Very singular good!-In faith, well

Moul. I was pricked well enough before, an you could have let me alone: my old dame will be undone now, for one to do her husbandry, and her drudgery; you need

not to have pricked me; there are other men fitter to go out

than I.

Fal.

Go to; peace, Mouldy, you shall go.

is time you were spent.

Moul. Spent!

Shal. Peace, fellow, peace; stand aside;

Mouldy, it

Know you

where you are?-For the other, Sir John :-let me see ;— Simon Shadow !

Fal. Ay marry, let me have him to sit under: he's like to be a cold soldier.

My mother's son, sir.

Fal. Thy mother's son! like enough; and thy father's shadow.

Shal. Do you like him, Sir John?

Fal. Shadow will serve for summer,-prick him ;-for we have a number of shadows to fill up the muster-book. Shal. Thomas Wart!

Fal. Thou art a very ragged wart.

Shal. Shall I prick him, Sir John?

Fal. It were superfluous; for his apparel is built upon his back, and the whole frame stands upon pins: prick him

no more.

Shal. Ha, ha, ha !-you can do it, sir; you can do it: I commend you well.-Francis Feeble!

Feeb. Here, sir.

Fal. What trade art thou, Feeble?

Feeb. A woman's tailor, sir.

Shal. Shall I prick him, sir?

Fal. You may: but if he had been a man's tailor, he would have pricked you. Wilt thou make as many holes in an enemy's battle, as thou hast done in a woman's gown? Feeb. I will do my good will, sir; you can have no more. Fal. Well said, good woman's tailor! well said, courageous Feeble! Thou wilt be as valiant as the wrathful dove, or most magnanimous mouse. Prick the woman's tailor well, master Shallow; deep, master Shallow, Feeb. I would, Wart might have gone, sir.

Fal. I would, thou wert a man's tailor; that thou might'st mend him, and make him fit to go. I cannot put him to a private soldier, that is the leader of so many thousands: Let that suffice, most forcible Feeble.

Feeb. It shall suffice, sir.

Fal. I am bound to thee, invincible Feeble. Who is next? Shal. Peter Bull-calf, of the green!

Fal. Yea, marry, let us see Bull-calf.

Bull.

Here, sir.

Fal. By my valour, a likely fellow !-Come, prick me Bull-calf, till he roar again.

Fal. What, dost thou roar before thou art pricked?
Bull. O, good sir! I am a diseased man.

Bull. A villanous cold, sir; a cough, sir; which I caught with ringing in the king's affairs, upon his coronation day, sir.

Fal. Come, thou shalt go to the wars in a gown ; we will have away thy cold; and I will take such order, that thy friends shall ring for thee. Is here all ?

Shal. Here is two more called than your number; you must have but four here, sir ;-and so I pray you, go in with me to dinner.

[Exeunt Falstaff, Shallow, and Silence. Bull. Good master corporate Bardolph, stand my friend; and here is forty shillings in French crowns for you. In very truth, sir, I had as lief be hanged, sir, as go: and yet, for mine own part, sir, I do not care; but, rather, because I am unwilling, and for mine own part, have a desire to stay with my friends; else, sir, I did not care, for mine own part, so much.

Bard. Go to; stand aside.

Moul. And good master corporal captain, for my old dame's sake, stand my friend: she has nobody to do any thing about her when I am gone; and she is old, and cannot help herself: you shall have forty, sir.

Bard. Go to; stand aside.

Feeb. By my troth I care not; a man can die but once; I'll ne'er bear a base mind; an't be my destiny, so; an't be not, so. No man's too good to serve his prince; and, let it go which way it will, he that dies this year, is quit for

the next.

Bard. Well said; thou'rt a good fellow.